Design and development of a parallel robot based on an XY table for ankle rehabilitation

Abstract

The continuous passive motion (CPM) machines are used in the rehabilitation of members that have been injured to recover their range of motion and prevent stiffness. Nowadays, some CPM machines for knee, ankle, arm and elbow are available commercially. In this paper, a novel design of a parallel robot based on an XY table for ankle rehabilitation, that provides dorsiflexion-plantarflexion and abduction-adduction movements, is presented. Some results are presented in order to show the performance of the parallel robot for ankle rehabilitation. Proportional-derivative (PD), proportional-integral-derivative (PID) and generalised proportional integral (GPI) controllers for trajectory tracking are implemented in the virtual and physical prototype.